Review: Go green with the ANYCOM Bluetooth Solar Car-Kit

Lately, I’ve been reading a ton about going “green.” We’ve recycled for years at my house, but most recently I started doing it the correct way, with the plastic and paper truly separated and left out for the recycle company to take away.

Of course, when it comes to electronics, that’s where I still need help. I have backup power supplies, laptops, desktops, printers, lights, and just about anything you can think of that’s electronic constantly running in my house. I guess that’s still going to be a work in progress.

As for my car, I drive a Toyota Camry, pre-hybrid days; and an SUV is my other car, so no chance of going “green” there.

In the spirit of going “green,” I jumped at the chance to give ANYCOM’s Bluetooth Solar Car-Kit a go. The package itself came with a sticker that said “GO GREEN!” on it, so that alone was a reason to take a second look. My favorite part, even before giving it a go, was the claim that it could charge itself using the embedded solar panel–no need to wrestle with more wires in my car.

The ANYCOM Bluetooth Solar Car-Kit is pretty straightforward in its implementation. It comes with a windshield mount, suction cups, and 3M tape (you can decide which method you want to use for mounting it), a car charger with USB cable (for those moments when you’re not charged up or there’s no sun), and a user manual written in 7 different languages.

For my test, I figured I’d mount it to the windshield using the provided suction cups, since the manual actually shows a picture for the “Recommended Installation Position.” I then took the Solar Car-Kit and placed it into the mount. Next, I turned the kit on by pressing the multi-function button / phone icon for 2 seconds. I was greeted with a booting tone and a flashing status LED. I then paired it with my iPhone, which required that I shut the Solar Car-Kit off again.

The mount is pretty straightforward

This is the preferred mounting spot. I tried it in other places, and the callers said that the voice quality did not change

The pairing process worked exactly as I had hoped with me shutting the Car-Kit off, then pressing and holding the multi-function button for 5 seconds. I heard two short beeps after the boot up tone, previously mentioned, and then searched for available devices through the Bluetooth interface on the iPhone. The iPhone found the kit right away, and when I selected it, I entered in 0000 for the passkey. I then heard a beep letting me know that it was paired, and the iPhone interface also indicated that pairing was successful.

Next, I dialed a number. Seconds later I heard a confirmation tone right before the audible dialing and then moments later heard the person on the other end through the Car-Kit. The speaker quality was excellent, and the volume adjusted higher than I needed it, which is a huge plus for any car kit.

Notice that it was perfectly recognized by the iPhone

Features
The ANYCOM Bluetooth Solar Car-Kit has a bunch of cool features built-in. Most notably is the solar panel, which keeps the Car-Kit constantly charging as long as there is sun available. According to the manual, 3 hours of sunlight buys you 30 minutes of talk time, and the Car-Kit will continue to charge while you talk, too. If there’s no sun or you are paranoid, you can use the included USB cable and car charger and charge away from your cigarette lighter–a full charge takes 2 hours.

close-up of the solar panel, which is on the opposite side of the multi-function button

As for other features, it includes the usual feature set of a wireless car kit, but the execution of them is flawless. For example, you can redial the person you just dialed by just clicking the multi-function button. This is a great feature except that the button is so large that I found myself accidentally hitting it when raising the volume level at times. There’s also volume up and down buttons.

That’s it, button-wise, but those buttons do a lot. For example, to check the battery status hold the volume up and down buttons simultaneously and then release them. The battery status is indicated by the number of red flashes and a beeping sound. For example, out of the box, my unit beeped 3 times, indicating more than 5 hours of use was available. You can also check your Solar Power Charging Status by pressing the volume down button for 5 seconds when you turn the unit on. If it’s receiving enough sunlight, the battery status LED will glow red.

In addition to the above, you can mute your call (press the volume down button for 1 second), reject a call (press the multi-function button for one second when a call is coming in), answer call waiting (press the multi-function button for one second while on a call), voice dial, and more.

The only complaint I have about the Car-Kit is that while I was using it while driving on the highway, some callers complained of hearing noise. I moved the Car-Kit closer to my mouth, but it didn’t seem to alleviate the problem. Since they could still hear me, just with some background noise, I’m not going to fault the company, though some better noise cancellation (this one uses Echo-Cancellation and Noise Reduction) in a future version couldn’t hurt.

Overall, the fact that I really don’t have to think about charging the car kit and just have to remember to enable Bluetooth on my phone, is a HUGE plus. Also, because of its unique design, it can just as easily work as a hands-free kit outside of the car in conference rooms or for impromptu conference calls.

For that reason, as well as others, it has now become my preferred car kit, supplanting the Parrot MINIKIT and has also been awarded a Geek.com Pick.

You can read more about the ANYCOM Bluetooth Solar Car-Kit at Anycom.com.